The windows through which we see wonderful things

Monthly Archives: April 2014

So this week’s post is inspired by a twitter conversation. Those are always the best, right? This one was between me and J_Marshak on fandom, and very specifically on what I have noticed in contemporary Harry Potter fandom. That is this: despite the overt signs in the books and movies themselves, there seems to be an increasing number of HP fans – within the fanfiction community at least – who are disturbingly fascist in their views of things.

So this is what I was talking about last time! I’m calling this inconsistent little feature “Ye Olde Longe-Boxe” (you can blame frequent commenter C-$ for that one), and it’s what it sounds like. I have some comics that are over twenty years old (never mind my habit of buying tons of back issues when I could find them when I was but a child), and sometimes I’ll dig down into them and find what sort of glory (or mess) we can discover together. Don’t expect this stuff every week, but hell, there are a lot of comics in there. I sorted through a bunch of comics and found what I think are some of the earliest I bought when I went out specifically to buy comics.

Hey guys! I’m in another state for a job interview! As in, typing in my hotel room. So this week’s post will not be, uh, coming anytime soon. I might get something up Friday when I am back in my comfortable nest.

I’ve been listening to a lot of Kevin Smith’s Fatman on Batmanpodcast, and one of the things Smith is always careful to do is to find out his guests’ histories with comic books themselves. Since it’s pretty unlikely I’ll be a guest on Fatman soon (I’ve taught comic books to college kids, Kev, if you’re reading!), I thought it might be fun and helpful to outline my own history of comics here. It’s fun because, well, I get to think about that golden time in my life, which at this point is “any time before today.” It will be helpful, though, because next week I want to start an intermittent project that will emerge in part from my long, but not lifetime, history of comic fandom. So consider this a prologue, if you want to.